Meet teacher turned sanitation warrior Prof Jyoti Lamba who built 10,000 toilets in Gujarat

“Seeing women wait for nightfall just so that they can take care of their body needs moved me, and that is what allowed me to take this work forward. In villages for women when there is no separate toilet and specifically the pregnant women and new mothers suffer more,” she said.

 

 

Lamba, who is a professor at Ahmedabad University, also added that while building the infrastructure can be done easily, changing people’s behaviour and mindset is a much harder task that requires the help of families and communities in unity. This work brought her much joy and satisfaction, Prof Lamba added.

Mission Swachhta Aur Paani is a sanitation campaign by Network18 and Hapric that advocates equality for all genders, abilities, castes and classes and strongly believes that clean toilets are a shared responsibility and that everyone should have access to the same. With women often being disproportionately affected by a lack of proper sanitation and hygiene, it is especially important to ensure that all women should have the right to equal access to washrooms and clean toilets.